BEIJING – Two bricklayers, a security guard and a cement buyer walked across the vast Olympic Green they helped build, holding some of the games’ hottest tickets in their deeply tanned hands.

About 300,000 migrant workers helped build the Olympics venues. None was expected to watch them. Many left Beijing this summer – no longer welcome – as construction stopped for the games, forcing them to look for work elsewhere. But these four men returned, brought back by a chance encounter.

A year ago, a Chinese artist found them on their lunch break and asked them to pose for a portrait. He made a promise: If he could sell the painting for enough money, he’d get them tickets to the games and pay for their expenses. The men were making $5 a day and just working and sleeping. They’d never even seen the Great Wall. They simply didn’t believe him.

But the painting sold for more than $4,600, with an art collector adding 2,008 yuan (about $290) to the asking price in honor of the Olympic year.

China has 140 million migrant workers – equal to the population of Russia – who have abandoned hardscrabble farm lives in rural areas for factory or construction jobs in the big cities and coastal areas.

They spend years toiling in low-paying, backbreaking jobs in the hopes of saving enough to support relatives back home but are often treated like second class citizens by white-collar urbanites who blame them for petty crime, crowding, and lost jobs.

There is also some sympathy and gratitude for the migrants – the human fuel behind China’s white-hot economy.

So on Monday the four workers were on their way to watch sports history in the making.

The migrant workers had arrived two days earlier for their first real vacation. They’d seen the Great Wall and eaten Peking duck. Now they’d be sports fans.

“Let’s see how long the money lasts,” said the artist, Su Jian. “I’m paying for everything.”

IOC formally expels Greek hurdler for doping

The IOC formally expelled Greek hurdler Fani Halkia from the Beijing Olympics for doping and urged Greek authorities to investigate her coach for possible criminal violations.

Halkia, the 2004 Olympic women’s 400-meter hurdles champion, tested positive for the steroid methyltrienolone at a Greek training camp in Japan on Aug. 10 before arriving in Beijing.

Notified of the result, she pulled out of the games Sunday and flew home to Greece.

The International Olympic Committee, which set up a disciplinary commission to investigate the case, said Halkia had been officially kicked out of the games and had her accreditation revoked.

The IOC asked the International Association of Athletics Federations to take any further sanctions. Under global anti-doping rules, Halkia faces a two-year ban for a steroid offense.

In addition, the IOC said it was reporting the matter to Greek authorities and requesting they investigate possible violations of Greek law, in particular by her coach, George Panagiotopoulos.

The IOC said it reserved the right to take sanctions against the coach. Panagiotopoulos is also the coach of Greek sprinter Tassos Gousis, who tested positive for the same steroid and was sent home a few days before the Olympics.

“This decision shows the determination of the IOC to broaden the fight against doping to those behind athletes,” the committee said.

Halkia’s backup “B” sample was tested Sunday and also came back positive for methyltrienolone, which the IOC described as a dangerous drug that “may lead to serious consequences to the health of athletes, even threatening their lives.”